


Lifetimes

by gazeteur



Category: The Grisha Trilogy - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Immortals
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-13
Updated: 2019-02-13
Packaged: 2019-10-27 14:40:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17768690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gazeteur/pseuds/gazeteur
Summary: He was a slip of smoke in the snowstorm, surely, when she turned to look out the window.But Alina knew, over the millenniums that have passed and bled away like sand, that this was the only instinct she could trust without question.Well,Alina thought, poking at the hearth.Better him than the wolves.——Darklina immortals AU.





	Lifetimes

I.

_ 1500s: Medieval Russia _

**The Black Rider**

 

He was a slip of smoke in the snowstorm, surely, when she turned to look out the window.

But Alina knew, over the millenniums that have passed and bled away like sand, that this was the only instinct she could trust without question. _Well,_ Alina thought, poking at the hearth. _Better him than the wolves._

She did not look up when the door swung open, sending plumes of snow and a skin-biting wind indoors. Instead, she spoke over the snow-hewn footfalls like the sound of them were nothing at all. “Have you come to argue? Or have you come for my hand? Or is it… You’ve grown bored of telling the peasants stories of firebirds and old wars and…”

But he said nothing, only sat down, taking the poker, and continued the task of stoking the coals. Alina eyed him, briefly, before looking down at the loaf of bread in her hand, hardened from storage. She was about to eat it, but it seemed that her appetite had suddenly evaporated.

He was dressed aptly for the weather, Alina noticed. All in furs and leathers, all pitch-dark as night. Of all the things that have slipped through his fingers, he had not lost his penchant for the colour black. He looked weary, like he’d ridden through the night and the whole of the day. These were trying times, even for a man who once sought power and wore the mantle of it like a second skin.

Isn’t it a foolish task?” she asked, straying in order to get a rise out of him, _anything._

“By your definition of ‘foolish’, then, we must both be fools.”

Alina scoffed. “I wonder, which one of us is it that hasn’t made peace with that?”

“You were angry,” he ventured, picking up an old argument. He took the mug she offered by its rim, fingers splayed above it—caging its warmth.

“It’s too late for that,” Alina snapped. But the truth was this: she could not remember when she left back then, or why she did so. And if she did recall the reason eventually, she knew she would hate it.

He raked a hand through his hair, sighing softly. Alina tried not to stare. “What do you really want, Alina?”

“To not feel so cold.”

“You mean to end winter.” His words carried the slightest edge of incredulity, dulled by years of— What was this that they were doing, now? Biting tongues, cowing heads and prostrating to kings who have barely tasted true power—let alone drowned in it whole.

_Yes,_ her mind answered, as she mindlessly circled one wrist with a hand. She let go before he could see. “Well, I can pretend that that’s the case, can’t I?”

But something else laid in the air, unspoken, another spell she must break. “Why have you come?” Alina asked.

His hand shifted, perilously close to hers. The fire threw light over the back of it, illuminating pale flesh. And paler scars—the imprints of rope and other things that bore the wisp of fire.

His smile was bitter. “Am I not allowed to pay visits to old friends anymore?”

“I don’t think you care what I do.”

“No, not like this. Not in these times.”

The answer surprised her. But what had changed? This was a period marked by wars fought for expansion and countless plagues that ravaged inwards. Meanwhile, stories of a ruthless Tsar trickled out of Moscow and through the countryside—like snowmelt tainted with blood. Even the very air that they breathed tasted different: sharp, insipid, and with the unsettled sensation of being so far away from the first thaw—not knowing which way the coin will fall.

The silence, flecked by the occasional splutter of flame, thirsted for an explanation to fill it, but none came. But she had some idea, beginning from the scars half-hidden by his cloak sleeves.

“You’re serving another master,” she concluded bluntly.

He did not say anything, so the barb must have landed right. The flame from the fireplace was reflected in his eyes, colouring the filaments within them not-so-cold.

“A boyar who wants power desperately enough, to cage what he does not know,” Alina guessed, referring to the rank of ruling aristocracy below the Tsar.

He stilled, the slip imperceptible except to the right eyes. Allowed the accusation to roll over him like waves over rocks. “Do you think so lowly of me, Alina?” he asked, a small hurt laying unmasked in his voice.

“It isn’t right.”

“And what isn’t? Nothing is right about us as well.” His tight grip on propriety returned when he continued, stiffly, “You wish to be left alone. So, I will take my leave,” With measured steps he exited the house, disappearing into the stables.

He emerged with a horse led by its bit, its fine coat gleaming obsidian. Its magnificence—something out of a mural adorning the grand churches of Moscow—took Alina’s breath away. The stallion’s ears were pricked, while its breath misted clouds in the winter night.

So many ironies: one by one, they rose up like smoke signals sieved out from the trees.

The way his words came out, each one shackled with caution.

The glimpse of gold embroidery, snaking across a sea of too-fine black beneath his cloak, as he mounted his horse.

And that fine, black stallion—almost inconceivable, in the ruthless thick of a winter that had taken the lives of peasants and lesser aristocracy alike.

Alina wanted to laugh, but managed only a colourless scoff. “No, you’re working for the Tsar.” _Because you would deign to serve no one lower._

He only turned his head slightly in acknowledgement, but not in answer. He nudged his horse away from the hut in the middle of nowhere, about to race into the cover of the forest.

Alina marched up to him and his great big stallion, uncaring of the way her shoes sank into the snow up to her bare ankles, of how she was ill-dressed for a snowstorm. The wind stung her eyes. “After all these years, why? Saints, answer me!”

His grip slackened on the reins. Alina had seen that look in his eye before; like nothing else mattered, like every price was a price worth paying. He could’ve gone and left her in the dark but he waited, still. _For what?_ Alina thought, shivering.

Snow dusted his shoulders like stars. The moon lay as a dark glint in his eyes. “The Tsar is dead, Alina,” he said with a false gentleness, even as something wild flickered behind his quartz eyes. “You and I both know this: we are beholden to no master.”

The sure sound of hoofbeats echoed in the night, and he was gone.

When the knife of shock finally lost its bite, Alina kneeled in the snow. Her fingers sought its chill and held tight—like a hand around a heart. _Moscow is short of two days’ ride away,_ she realised. Her eyes shut. _He came back, to ask what he would always ask._

But he did not.

Perhaps they’d both learned their lessons well.

Alina stood only when her teeth begin to chatter violently and the warmer—but not warm—confines of her home called out to her.

And if he did ask, what could she even say? _Come back. Leave._ These were hollowed-out words they would cast at each other until time—and the universe itself—finally decided to hold them still.

**Author's Note:**

> A little something for Villaintines Day!
> 
> So this fic kind of assumes that the events in TGT happened A Very Long Time Ago, and somehow they're the only ones to come out of it alive, 'cause immortality.
> 
> This is potentially multi-chapter (with multiple caveats, seeing how infrequently I update), with the two of them leading different lives throughout different parts of history and, in general, being 2 Tired Immortals that bother each other over the millennium lmao.


End file.
